• Having problems with creditors, debt collectors and others calling you non-stop?

  • Having issues with random numbers calling you up with offers too good to be true?

If so, boy do I have THE solution for you and it’s name is: Should I Answer. Now there’s nothing new about community driven call blocking software. Scam number calls you, you block the number and the next person might not have to deal with that call anymore. But let’s face it, you either have to add these numbers manually or hope that someone else has blocked them.

But that also brings on a separate issue which is voicemail. Now there’s nothing worse than having go go through a bunch of voicemails left by blocked numbers to delete them. So what can you do? Well, SIA has you covered for that too. They have an option (currently in beta) that allows blocked calls to be flushed instead of forwarded to the voicemail. You even have the options of removing the phone numbers from the call logs.

 

Installing Should I Answer:

Installing SIA should be quite simple. It is available on the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store free of charge of course.

 

The Settings:

Now this is the most important part because as a default install not much will happen. I will walk you through step-by-step to get you all set up and on the way to blocking all of those nasty calls.

 

Step 1 : Level of Protection

So the first step is pretty straight forward, choosing the level of protection that we want, in this case Active.

Protection Level

 

Step 2 : Choosing Call Screen

 

This is where things start getting interesting, we need to choose how we want the app to interact with us. To have access to advanced features you must select custom call screen.

Phone App Screen

 

And then follow the link to the system settings in order to change the phone app to Should I Answer.

Settings Page Link

 

Phone App Selection

 

Step 3 : Blocking Settings

Now this is where you really get to select how you want to deal with blocking calls. The example that follows is a somewhat aggressive approach to blocking calls.

 

Advanced Blocking Settings

 

And finally the best option of all of them, Pick Up And Hang Up calls. This picks up the call for 2 seconds and then hangs up. This bypasses the voicemail thus no more unwanted voicemails.

 

Pick and Hang Up option

 

Step 4 : Notifications Settings

This section contains all of the options for notifications. The first option allows you to see the calling card after a call with the phone number and any information found on it in the database.

 

The second option is for being notified after a call was blocked. This is one of the options you can disable if you plan on disabling the blocked calls log .

 

Notifications Settings

 

Step 5 : Blocking Numbers Using Masks

Now as you can see in the screenshot below, I have blocked any and all numbers coming from the 505-989- . This is quite a useful option since some of these companies get batches of numbers that usually are within the same range. To block phone numbers in this fashion, just add a * IE 505-989-*.

 

Adding Masked Number

 

Remember that this option blocks all calls from 505-989- numbers so you need to be sure that no one you know uses that prefix before enabling it. It can obviously also be deactivated at any time by removing it from the list.

 

Listed Masked Number

 

Step 6 : Other Settings

These are the final settings you can mess around with. As you can see, this is also where you can change what theme you want to use.

 

Other Options

 

Conclusion:

So ultimately at the end of the day, you might not be able to block all unsolicited calls but you can get very close to it. Also the fact that you can have blocked calls flushed instead of being forwarded to your voicemail is a win in my book.